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| A Russian gulag museum is facing legal action from the government and may be forced to close. Image: Shutterstock |
A Russian
organization in charge of the restoration of a Soviet-era gulag is facing legal
action aimed at pressuring it to close.
Viktor Shmyrov,
director of the Perm-36 association, announced today that his organization is
facing a 1.5 million ruble ($30,000) lawsuit filed by regional authorities who
want the restored forced labor camp, now a museum, to shut down. The dispute centers around the land, which
has currently been removed from Shmyrov’s organization.
"This is a way to pressure us and destroy us," he
told The Associated Press.
Historians say that Soviet authorities sent about 15 million
people to gulags between 1930 and 1950.
Perm-36, also called ITK-6 camp, was one of those gulags, established in
1946 as a logging camp near the Siberian border, where prisoners cut down and
processed trees to be used to rebuild cities damaged during the war. Similar gulags throughout the country housed
150,000 inmates, making up one third of the working population during the late
1940s. Perm-36 included four barracks
for 250 prisoners each, a punishment block, a hospital, outhouses, and a
headquarters building. The camp released
its last prisoner in 1988.
Perm-36 was derelict and taken over by volunteers in
2009. It was reworked into a museum that
drew in visitors from around the world.
The restoration took place thanks to donations from private
international donors, which may be part of the reason it is facing legal action
now from the Putin government.
State-sanctioned patriotism in Russia lately has combined
with a desire to downplay problematic historical elements in the country,
particularly with regard to Soviet dictator Josef Stalin, whose political
leanings have become more popular within the current leadership. Because of this, the refurbished Perm-36 was
closed temporarily earlier this year, and it may not be allowed to reopen, pending
the outcome of the lawsuit.
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